CRASH (A Logan Brothers Novel) (6 page)

I cruised up and the down the
streets nearby, my eyes darting around for somewhere, anywhere, to
park. Eventually I came upon a lot, a smattering of cars inside, a
couple of streets away. It looked to be connected to a casino, a big
flashy sign outside with the name -
Logans
.

I drove in and found a spot at
the back, paying for a ticket at the machine and turning towards Main
Street.

A few minutes later I was
walking down the main shopping street in town. It was filled with
chain and boutique clothing outlets, interspersed with small cafe's
and the odd bar.

The place was truly bustling, no
surprise for a Saturday, and I had to literally fight my way up the
street to find the sort of shops I was looking for.

Shopping was, oddly, never a
huge passion of mine. I liked wearing nice clothes and looking
pretty, but I'd rather do so without having to worry about buying the
clothes in the first place. If possible, it would be nice and
convenient if the sort of clothes I liked could just be delivered
straight to my front door.

I know, I know, what about
online shopping, right? Well screw that, if i'm gonna buy something,
I want to know it's going to fit properly first!

It took me a surprisingly long
time to find the sort of thing I was looking for - woolly jumpers,
scarves, hats, a thick coat for those truly cold nights. Most shops I
went into seemed to be rolling out their summer wear, with shorts,
T-shirts, skirts, and the like gracing the front of their stores.

In fact, come to think of it,
most people were cruising round with little more than a layer or two
on. It really must be me, coming from warmer climes. Everyone else
seemed to be hardy against the cold.
Maybe it wasn't even cold to
them.

Eventually I'd managed to fill a
few bags with appropriate cold weather gear.

“
Going to Alaska?” said a
guy as he walked past me down the street, peering into my bag.

None of your damn business.
Creep.

I walked on, my battle with the
crowd now even more difficult than before owing to the bags I was
carrying. They served to literally double the width of my body,
forcing me to carry them out in front of my as I ploughed on through
the masses.

And this is exactly why I
HATE shopping on weekends.

I got a few funny looks as I
went, before eventually bursting out and turning off Main Street and
back towards my car. The crowd thinned immediately, the other streets
lacking in many points of interest, although there was a beautiful
church that did seem to catch the attention of a group of Chinese
tourists.

I let out a gasp as I reached my
car, opening it up and chucking my bags on the back seat. As I leaned
in I felt a tug behind me, ripping at my arm. It was the strap of my
handbag, someone pulling it from my body.

I turned to see a hooded man
scrambling at the bag, dragging the strap over my arm as he ripped it
towards him.

My heart was almost catapulted
from my chest as the mugger hugged the handbag to his pec like a
football and turned, twisting on the spot and galloping off out of
the parking lot and down the street.

I heard a shout behind me as I
stood, stricken against the side of the car.

“
HEY!”

In the blink of an eye a man
went shooting past me from behind. He sped like a cheetah hunting its
prey, flying towards the mugger as he shot off down the street. But
he had too much of a head start. There was no way he'd be caught.

Fucking little toad.

I could tell that the chaser
realized the game was up quick enough as well. He must have been
about 50 meters in front of me when he turned around.

I lost a breath when I saw who
it was.

Crash.

That intense, irritatingly good
looking, guy from last night.

As he turned I saw that his eyes
were burning in rage again, although they quickly changed at the
sight of me. I didn't exactly consider my purse getting stolen to be
funny, but his face made it pretty clear that those were his thoughts
on the matter.

Of all the people to try to be
my savior.

He slowly walked towards me, the
amusement in his eyes gradually washing away at the look on my face.
I wasn't quite sure what to think, so much had already happened in
the last 24 hours that I wasn't even sure if I was actually awake.

OK Elle, time to wake up.
Lets get back to reality.

But this was reality. I had
actually been mugged. I was actually now glaring at this guy walking
at me, the type of guy I'd usually be too shy to even look at.

“
Are you OK,” he said as he
got closer. He was taller than I remembered from last night. He must
have been at least 6' 3”, his shoulders wide beneath his jacket. He
wore a sharp suit without a tie, dark grey over a black shirt.

“
I'm fine. Thanks for trying
to help.” I spoke more confidently that I usually would with a guy
like this. I guess it must have been the adrenaline. Somehow talking
to a hot guy wasn't quite so intimidating when you'd just had your
bag snatched away from you.

“
Don't mention it. Elle,
right?” He eyed me up quickly, snaking his eyes over me and
reaching out a hand.

I nodded, taking it. I was
surprised he remembered my name. He didn't seem to take any notice of
me at all when Alice introduced me last night.

His grip was firm, his hand
engulfing my petite fingers and palm.

“
We never met properly last
night. I had other things on my mind.” The blaze in his eyes was
gone, although I could still see a fire burning back there. I
wondered if that intensity ever went away.

“
What did he take?” he
asked, sliding his hand back away from mine.

I quickly turned to the car to
see my keys still hanging in the door. Thank God I still had those.

“
My handbag,” I said,
turning back. “Shit, I had my purse in there, all my cards, my
phone.”

This was the worst timing
ever. Why was this happening to me right now. Seriously, why was I
being punished like this!

“
You'd better cancel your
cards right away. Come on inside, you can use my phone.”

“
Inside?”

“
The casino. It's mine.”

Crash

I stood looking down over the
casino floor from the balcony outside my office. Elle was inside,
using the phone. By the sound of it, she had several cards to cancel.
Probably another spoiled college rich kid using daddy's money.

My father had always been rich,
he'd always had money. But he never gave any free tickets, never gave
us money without making us work for it first. He'd placed us all in
charge off several of his business as we got older, when we'd proven
we were able to handle the responsibility.

Me, I'd managed a bar of his
when I was only 19. I'd done that for a few years before he felt
comfortable enough to hand over the keys to the casino. It was a
great way of teaching us that money for nothing meant just that,
nothing. Only money earned had value.

And I'd earned everything I had.
I'd worked hard for him, hard for the family. I'd helped grow the
casino, increasing our yearly takings year on year. Now I had plans
to expand further, even beyond what he'd achieved. Hopefully he'd be
looking down on me, feeling proud.

I'd been on the outskirts of
town that morning. I had to put that shit with Kyle out of my head
for now. There were much more pressing things to attend to.

Casino's what was I knew, and a
lot of land was being put up for auction in a prime spot outside of
the city. I'd been at a meeting with investors to secure the plot,
and the funds to build a casino to put
Logans
to shame.

There was no way I could afford
it on my own. Even if I liquidated all of dads assets, it still would
fall way short of the amount I'd need. This was the big time,
something beyond my fathers wildest dreams. But I knew casinos. I
knew I could make something that would make the other family
businesses look like lemonade stands at the side of the road.

I heard a click behind me and
Elle walked out. She didn't look best pleased.

“
All done?”

She nodded. “Thanks for
helping, I appreciate that.”

“
Don't mention it.” She
looked remarkably downcast, more than if you'd only lost a few credit
cards and your phone. I'm sure she'd have insurance for that.

“
Hey, you look like you could
use a drink? I've got a meeting in about half an hour. Wanna help me
fill the gap?”

She looked up at me, a sheepish
look on her face, and nodded.

“
Thanks,” she said, “that
might help.”

I turned her round and pointed
her back towards my office. “It doubles as a bar,” I joked,
trying to lighten the tone. There was something delicate about this
girl, something innocent.

I walked her in and sat her down
on the leather sofa, stretched along the right wall of the room.

“
What's your poison then? You
don't seem like a hard spirits kind of girl!”

She screwed up her face and
shook her head. “Only when part of a fruity cocktail.” She
smiled, her face lighting up briefly, before closing her lips tight
once more.

“
OK, well I have some lemonade
here. How about that with some vodka?”

She nodded before I poured the
drinks, mine without the lemonade.

“
So Elle, tell me,” I said
as I sat down beside her, “how long have you known Alice?” I
wondered whether she was one of her colleagues, whether she worked
for Kyle.

Impossible. Not this girl.
Look at her, she'd blow over in a light wind.

“
About 18 hours.”

“
18 hours! So you're a friend
of - what's her name - Tess?”

“
No, only just met her as
well. I just moved here yesterday.”

“
Ahh, so you're at college.
Funny time to join isn't it?”

“
Yeah, it's a long story. I'm
not sure there's time to tell you before your meeting,” she joked,
a smile once more growing on her face.

It was a cute face, her features
small and soft. She had these sky blue eyes and shoulder length
blonde hair. There was a purity about her that I rarely came into
contact with. Not in my line of work. Not with the sort of girls I
dated.

“
Another time perhaps.”

“
And you,” she said, “how
long have you run this casino. You don't seem old enough for the
job.”

She was coy when asking the
question, as if she felt she might be overstepping the mark.

“
A few years. It belonged to
my father, he had me run it for him. He was killed several months
ago.”

The words still stung as I spoke
them. She didn't push the issue, just passed along her condolences.
I'd had enough of hearing how sorry people were though.

No, I wanted revenge.

We spoke for a little while
longer as she sipped away on her vodka lemonade. She grimaced
slightly as she sipped it - I'd probably overdone the ratios.

I felt strangely open talking to
her. I don't know what it was. Maybe the fact that she was unlike
anyone else I knew. Maybe it was because she was detached from my own
life, someone who'd just moved here and had no preconceptions about
me.

I knew what people thought of
me. I knew they saw me as this intense guy who'd fly into a rage over
anything. Sure, I had a temper, but that wasn't all I was. It was
just what people remembered about me. The fury. The anger. They knew
nothing of me really. No one did.

Even my name, Crash. It was like
a self-fulfilling prophesy. The name had stuck from when I was a
teen, getting into fights and stamping my authority over the other
kids. My friends said I was like a car crash, wrecking lives and
causing pain.

Great friends they were.

I liked the name at first. It
went with my bad boy image, this merciless motherfucker who'd take no
shit from anyone.

“
Crash is coming, and he'll
fuck you up.”

No one messed with my brothers,
no one messed with my friends. And not only because my father was
Charles Logan.

Because I was Crash Logan.

....

I sudden knock at the door broke
me from my thoughts.

I looked up to see Kyle standing
behind the glass, a stern look on his face.
And they say I'm
intense. The way Kyle's been recently I wouldn't be surprised if he
developed a worse reputation than me soon enough.

“
Elle, there's my 2.30. He
doesn't look like he'll want to be kept waiting.”

She glanced through the glass at
Kyle. “Yeah, I'll go. I don't wanna get caught in another one of
your slanging matches.”